Specific actions include setting up a regional office for the safe consumption of alcohol based on the highly successful Fresh – Smoke Free North East model.

A director has been appointed and the office, based in Darlington, will be operational early in 2009.

Regional advisory groups have been created from across the public, private, voluntary and community sectors to take work forward in all ten areas.

They will be supported by the establishment of a regional public health centre of research excellence, which was announced in early 2008.

The £5 million development is one of five nationally – and the only one based on a substantial regional collaboration.

A social marketing and communications collaborative is also being established to help make the strategy a reality.

Professor Sir Liam Donaldson, the Chief Medical Officer, chairs the North East Public Health Board, the group overseeing the strategy.

Mr Brown said: “The health of people living in the North East has been too poor for too long.

“We are consistently top of the health league for all the wrong reasons, partly as a legacy of heavy industry and partly because of our lifestyles.

“It is to the credit of Dr Singleton and his colleagues that they have taken an unrelentingly optimistic approach to what can be achieved – and I look forward to the day when the North East is the healthiest region in the country.”